Educational card game



Aug. 19,1952 c. H. M-ATHEs EDUCATIONAL CARD GAME Filed July 14, 1947 I6227/93 H Mikes 3nnentor (Ittomegs Patented Aug. 19, 1952 OFFICEEDUCATIONAL CARD GAME Charles H. Mathes, Seattle, Wash. Application July14, 1947, Serial No. 760,794

. 3 Claims.

My present invention relates to the general art of card games and moreparticularly to an educational card game.

The majority of card gamesare created for the express purpose ofentertaining players. In contra-distinction tothis general premise, Ihave provided a card game in which the conventional card-deck of 52cards is employed, but on the faces of which I have provided, withappropriate symbols, information which shows the political voting trendsas averaged over a period of thirty years. This game has been createdwith the intent of' interesting particularly the younger generation in astudy of political science, and the game as "played has been found notonly to acquaint children, or even adults, as to the general'votingtendencies in our various States, but, in the case of children, itexcites their, curiosity to the point that they become genuinelyinterested in a study of the political organization and structure ofthese United States.

Further, successfulplaying of the game makes it necessary to keep trackof the number of votes or electoral college members that each opposingplayer or pair of players may have, and this carrying of a runningftotalin ones-mind is in itself mind training an'd o'f real value.

The principal object of my educational game is to provide the meanswhereby individuals can easily acquire knowledge as to thevotingtendencies in thevarious States-of the United States.

A- further' object of my present invention'is to provide means wherebyan individual can gradually and easily learn the number of electoralvotes to-WhichJeach State of the United States is entitled. J This'igame'also naturally gives the number. of representativesand senators in eachState; I .1

A further object of my invention is to perpetuateand'familiarizethyounger generation with the symbols which are, in'efiect, the trade-marks of the principal political parties.

A further object of my invention is to bring out, particularly toyounger minds, the reasons why certain States are very valuable to apolitical party in a general election, and why some other States are ofmuch lesser importance.

A further object of my present invention is to employ a deck of regularplaying cards which are merely over-printed with the informationessential to my game and, in this way, the deck may be used'for normalplaying games or may be ,used'specifically for the'political educationalpurposes.-

A further object of my invention is to provide on thevarious cards ofmy'playing deck the information concerning the electoral votes and howthe different States have voted during the past thirty years, so thatthis information will be readily available during an election period sothat the game can be carried to a logical conclusion, particularly byyoungsters who, from a study of the daily papers and their electionforecasts, can make their own predictions as to the outcome of anyelection. This in'itself has been found to be a.greatinterest-sustaining feature.

Further objects, advantages and capabilities will be apparent from thedescription and disclosure in the drawing or may be comprehended or areinherent in the game.

In the drawings:

Fig. 1 is a "representation of selected cards from my playing deck, thered cards of the deck have been appropriately sectioned to indicatetheir colors.

Referring more particularly to the disclosure in the drawing, thenumeral l0 designates the card nomenclature and gives not only the Stateor territory n'ame,- but also the number of electoral college votesallotted to that political subdivision. At present this allocation is asfollows I Table I.

Alabama 11 Nebraska 7 Arizona 1 3 Nevada 3 Arkansas 9 New Hampshire 4California 22 New Jersey 16 Colorado 6 New Mexico 3 Connecticut 8 NewYork 47 Delaware 3 North Carolina' 13 Florida 7 North Dakota 4 Georgia 1Ohio 26 Idaho 4 Oklahoma 11 Illinois 29 Oregon 5 Indiana 14 Pennsylvania36 Iowa 11 Rhode Island 4 Kansas 9 South Carolina 8 Kentucky 11 SouthDakota 4 Louisiana 10 Tennessee 11 Maine 5 Texas 23 Maryland 8 Utah 4Massachusetts 17 Vermont 3 Michigan 19 j Virginia 11 Minnesota 11Washington 8 Mississippi l 9 West Virginia 8 Missouri 15 Wisconsin 12Montana 4 Wyoming 3 The deuces are assigned to territories, as fol- 3lows: Hearts to Hawaii, Diamonds to Alaska, Spades to Puerto Rico, andClubs to the Philippine Islands.

The numerals l2 and I l designate, respectively, the. donkey symbol ofthe Democratic party and the elephant symbol of the Republican party.These symbols are to be taken as merely representative of symbols usedby the principal political parties as they are, or may be established inthe future by actual elections.

Further political party designations are assigned to the cards bearingthe State name generally as shown by past elections.

The determination of the rank of the cards assigned to various States ison the basis of their electoral vote strength, as far as practical; thusNew York, with an electoralvote of 47, is assigned the highest red card,the ace of hearts, and Pennsylvania, with 36 electoral votes, thehighest black card, the ace of spades.

In-playing .my game, the primary intent is to provide a game strategywhich is based upon a general-understanding and appreciation of howelectoral :votes are divided among the various States. The mere factthat intelligent playing of the game to win requires this preestablishedinformation in the mind of the player, requires consideration and studywhich may actually be achievedthrough repeated playing of the game.

In playing, the 52 cards of the deck are normallydivided. up among thefour players much as abridge hand is dealt, the cards being dealt one atat time around the table, until each player hashis thirteen cards.

Whenthe player scans his cards, he will be able to make appraisal ,ofthe strength of his hand and, on the basis of his knowledge of thedistribution of electoral votes in the various States which arerepresented on the individual cards, he will planlhis playing strategyand determine in his mind Whether his better chances of winning are toplay his hand for the one principal political party or the other. V

The markings of the cards, as previously indicated andas will beobserved on thedrawings, are arranged so that the blacksuits, as clubsand spades, will represent one political party, and the red suits, asthe hearts and diamonds, will represent the opposing principal politicalparty. The

, playing effect is to divide the deck into two suits of 26 cards, onesuit black and one suit red. The order of rank of the cards is from acedown to the deucein each suit, with hearts being higher of thesame'denomination than diamonds, and likewise, spades of the samedenomination being higher than the corresponding club card.

The play starts by the player to, the dealers left having theinitiallead, and his lead, whether ning. It may be assumed, forinstance, that he prefersto lead an ace of spades or hearts which, inaccordance with'their lead, would be the high cards.

The lead of either a blackcard or a red card gives trump value to thatcolor lead so that, for instance, a deuceof clubs, which is the lowestof the black cards, would take a trick composed of red cards, withoutregard to their .face value.

When a player leads a high card of his preferred color,'it is tobepresumedthat the No. 2 player will slufloff a low card which willleast affect the strength of his hand. No. 3 player, however, being thepartner of the leader, should preferably put on a high card of theopposing suit so 4 as to get the score, not that it will assist hispartner in winning in his elected party, but it will take a large numberof points away from his opponent and thus make him and his partner havea more advantageous position. Player No. 4, like player No. 2, normallywould sluif what he considers to be the card of least value to himselfand his partner.

It will be understood, it is believed, that there will ,be a largenumber of strategic plays very similar to what will be encountered inwhist, pinochle, or bridge games. Further, it is to be understood thatthe game can be played by two players, by a dealing and playingarrangement that is comparable to the game of honeymoon bridge, asdefined by Hoyle or other card-game authorities.

The lead player may play any card he may choose and the restrof theplayers have to play to the suit lead, unless they can take the trick bya higher card. However, black has to be played on black, and red hastobe played on red. Thus, if the 10 of diamonds is played, the 10 ofhearts or any higher heart or diamond will take the trick, but if aplayer is unable to take the trick, the next player must play to thecolor and suit lead; 1. -e., if a 10 of clubs is lead, and the playercannot take the trick, he has to play a club, if possible. If there areno-clubs in his hand, then a spade must be played. If, after all theface cards down to 10 have been played, and the lead play is the 8 ofdiamonds, and the next player has no diamonds, he plays a heart. If hehas no hearts, he may play any low count black card that he may wish to.Unless he plays to the suit card, he loses the trick, Hence, when alllarge count cards have been played to maintain the lead, the player mayplay cards that he feels his opponents are out of, and if he is correctin his assumption, he will take additional-tricks of low count cardswhich will make quite a gain in count for him.

The game proceeds on a trick-taking basis until all 52cards have beenplayed. The cards are then appraised somewhat like pinochle and theelectoral vote count of each card counted in favor of the playerholdingit. .Countis kept of the points scored until one side obtains apreviously agreed upon total of, say 1000 points and wins. I 7 I Undercertain conditions, the addition of the odd values of electoral votesmay be burdensome. A simplified scoring of 20 points for each ace, king,queen and jack, and a scoring-of 7 points for each of the cards from 10down to deuces will give a total score value of 544 points against anactual'point'scoreof 531, and is recommended especially for children'splay.

It is believed that it will be clearly apparent from the abovedescription and the disclosure in the drawings that the inventioncomprehends a novel educational card game.

Having thus disclosed the' invention, I claim: 1. In combinationwith a'four'suit deck of playing cards of conventional type, with the usualblack and red, colored suits and with conventional denominationyand suitmarkings in two oppositecorners and in the central portions, a ,marginalimprinting on opposite long sides of a card of said deck for each Statename, the number of electoral votes corresponding with said State andthe symbol of the political party usually predominant in said State, onesymbol being for the Republican party and being im-. printed on cards ofone color and one symbolbe- 5 ing for the Democratic party and beingimprinted on cards of the other color, and higher ranking cards havinggenerally the names of States having higher numbers of electoral collegevotes.

2. In combination with a four-suit deck of playing cards of conventionaltype withthe usual black and red colored suits and with conventionaldenomination and suit markings in two opposite comers and in the centralportions,

a marginal imprinting on opposite long sides of a card of said deck foreach State name, the number of electoral votes corresponding with saidState and the symbol of the political party usually predominant in saidState, on symbol being for the Republican party and one symbol being torthe Democratic party, and higher ranking cards having generally thenames of States having higher numbers of electoral college votes. 1

3. In combination with a four-suit deck of playing cards of conventionaltype and with conventional denomination and suit markings in Thefollowing references are of record in the file of this patent:

UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 20 1,000,095 Kyle et a1. Aug. 8,1911 1,012,574 Adams Dec. 26, 1911 1,048,346 Ritzman Dec. 24, 19121,855,543

REFERENCES CITED Dalton Apr. 26, 1932

